


The Things We Share

by mdr_24601



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types
Genre: Annie Cresta-centric, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Psychological Torture, The Capitol (Hunger Games)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-20
Updated: 2020-06-20
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:47:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24825532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mdr_24601/pseuds/mdr_24601
Summary: And just when Annie felt herself slipping away, fading from reality, Johanna’s voice would float from the vent on the wall. “Cresta. Tell me about Four.”
Relationships: Annie Cresta & Johanna Mason, Annie Cresta/Finnick Odair
Comments: 8
Kudos: 45





	The Things We Share

The cell was cold. Too cold. Annie wasn’t sure how long she’d been sitting there, curled up in the corner, shivering. It could have been hours. Maybe days. The lights were too bright and constantly on, so there was no way to tell time. It was just her and the cold and the lights. 

The heavy metal door swung open eventually. Annie didn’t look up to see who it was. 

“Miss Cresta.”

The voice was cold, with fake politeness, and she shivered instinctively. President Snow’s voice was recognizable due to the amount of times she’d heard it on television. 

“Do you know why you are here?”

She said nothing. 

Snow breathed deeply and Annie glanced up. He was flanked by two Peacekeepers, and his perfectly tailored suit looked out of place amongst the ill-fitting prison uniforms. 

“I’m very sorry to bring you such bad news,” Snow continued formally, and Annie got the feeling that he wasn’t very sorry at all. “Finnick is dead.”

The world was silent before Annie felt like she had been plunged into icy water. Her accelerating heartbeat thrummed in her ears as her shoulders heaved with panic. It felt like there was a weight around her ankles, dragging her down, down, down, until she had no hope of ever seeing the surface again. She was able to choke out one word. “No.”

“He didn’t survive the explosion in the arena,” Snow said, though it sounded like he was miles away. 

Annie’s breath came in labored gasps. That couldn’t be right. Surely, if Finnick was dead, she would know. She would feel it somehow. It wouldn’t feel like this. 

“He’s not dead!” a hoarse voice called out from beside her, female this time. It took Annie a moment to recall her name. Johanna Mason. She heard a swift kick, a grunt of pain. “Think about it, Cresta. If Finnick was dead, you wouldn’t be here.”

Her head broke the surface of the water, and Annie was back in her cell, with Snow in front of her and Johanna beside her. Johanna, Annie mused, was likely right. How many times had Snow used her against Finnick over the years? If Finnick was dead, there would be no more use for her. 

Snow smiled unpleasantly and left her room without another word. Johanna spoke up again. 

“They got you, too,” she said dryly, her voice raspy. 

“Is anyone else here?” Annie called back. 

A pause went by before Johanna said, “Peeta Mellark’s on my other side. I think they got Enobaria, too, but she’s probably not down here.”

Annie was silent for a long moment after that, lost in her thoughts. So Finnick was alive, but where? With the rebels, presumably, but where were they located? How was he doing? 

“Still there, Cresta?” Johanna asked. 

“Still here,” Annie confirmed softly.

* * *

The days passed in a blurry haze. Annie was only lucid some of the time, or so Johanna told her. Sometimes she would slip away, far off into her own little world, separated from reality. And sometimes she was right there in her cell, present in the moment. 

Annie wasn’t sure which times she liked better. 

There was never any silence, either. There were screams, Johanna’s and Finnick’s, and occasionally, Peeta’s. They played Finnick’s screams so often that her arms would ache from holding her hands to her ears and her entire body would be sore from clenching her muscles in tension. It took effort to remind herself that the screams were not real. Finnick wasn’t in pain. He was safe.

When the screams stopped getting to her, they showed recordings of Finnick smiling and holding and kissing other women. Capitol women. Their hands were on his body and his hands were on theirs, wandering and touching. 

“Miss Cresta,” they would say gently, as if talking to a child. “Do you really believe that Finnick Odair, who could have any woman he wanted, would love you?”

And Annie thought of Finnick—the real Finnick—and how he looked swimming with her in the ocean. How the skin around his eyes crinkled slightly when he was happy. How he held her hand and didn’t let go, like it was second nature for the two of them to be connected. Because it was. 

“That isn’t Finnick,” Annie would say in response. 

And they would just chuckle softly and click their tongues because poor, mad Annie Cresta couldn’t separate fantasy from reality. “Of course that’s Finnick,” they would tell her, with their condescending smiles. “It looks just like him.”

It looked like him, Annie reasoned, but it wasn’t. That was a mannequin dressed up to look like Finnick, because the skin around his eyes didn’t crinkle when he smiled and his hair was perfectly styled in the way real Finnick's never was. They didn’t know it, but Annie could tell when Finnick was performing. She could tell when it wasn’t real.

So Annie would just shake her head and close her eyes and they would disappear. 

“He does love you, you know.” Johanna’s voice brought Annie back. “You were all he could think about when he was in the Capitol.”

Annie didn’t say anything. 

“They can’t make you not love Finnick,” Johanna said with a small laugh. “Not like what they’re doing to Mellark.”

“What?” Annie asked, her voice hoarse from lack of use. 

“Yeah, they’re turning him against Katniss. He keeps screaming her name, but not in the way you scream for Finnick. He sounds angry.”

Annie winced. Is that what they were trying to do to her? Turn her against Finnick? The very thought seemed impossible, but it probably sounded impossible to Peeta, too. 

Johanna continued on. “But you two, you were so in love that it was disgusting. Seriously, I wanted to retch every time he said your name.”

She laughed, though it wasn’t funny. Still, Johanna’s words brought Annie a sense of certainty. Finnick loved her and she loved Finnick, and as far as Annie was concerned, that was enough to keep them both going. 

It had to be. 

* * *

The weeks went on. Annie could sometimes hear Peeta screaming, if she strained her ears. She could nearly always hear Johanna, screaming or talking or drawing deep, ragged breaths. Sometimes they played Finnick’s screams and Annie would scream along with him, her throat sore from the effort. 

And just when Annie felt herself slipping away, fading from reality, Johanna’s voice would float from the vent on the wall. “Cresta. Tell me about Four.”

And she did. Stories and memories and anything else Annie could think of. “Finnick and I used to collect sea glass and shells and make jewelry out of them.”

“Yeah?” Johanna asked, though her voice was strained. 

“And we would sell them for ridiculously low prices so anyone could buy them.”

Johanna laughed. “Yeah, that sounds like you two.”

“And it was warm there,” she said softly. Nothing like the bitter coldness of her cell, gradually sucking the warmth and life from her body. “What about Seven?”

“It’s cold in Seven. Snowed a lot. We’d chop down trees and use them as firewood.”

Annie smiled. “I’ve only seen snow on my Victory Tour. It doesn’t snow at all in Four.”

“I remember,” Johanna replied. “Four was the warmest place on my Tour, I think.”

Annie was lost in her thoughts, and for a moment, she could inhale and smell the salty air of the sea, listen to the waves breaking over the shoreline, see Finnick’s eyes light up as they waded into the water together. She missed home and its warmth, its life. 

“Cresta?”

“Still here,” she responded automatically, though she wished she wasn’t. 

* * *

Men in gray opened her cell door and Annie tensed instinctively. They held out a hand and helped her to her feet and said, “It’s okay, Annie, we’re taking you to Finnick.”

“Johanna,” Annie said frantically, because she wouldn’t let them forget Johanna. 

“She’s safe, we have her.”

She tried to walk but her legs wouldn’t work and it took all of Annie’s effort not to collapse. Finnick’s name was on her lips as they plunged the syringe into her arm and she passed out. 

* * *

They saw each other and Annie ran, any previous fatigue ignored. It was just her and Finnick, his smile and his eyes and then his lips were on hers. She was filled with such a sudden warmth that she almost gasped in surprise. Every kiss, every touch, breathed life into her again. 

Annie smiled so wide that she thought her face might have broken in half, but it didn’t. She caught a glimpse of Johanna being wheeled by on a hospital bed. The other woman caught her eye and gave her a slight nod, which Annie returned. 

Finnick didn’t let go of her hand, not once. Not during the medical examination, not when she was declared healthy and cleared to leave.

She stopped in Johanna’s hospital room. Johanna, who had kept her from losing herself in the Capitol. Who screamed until her throat was raw and she couldn’t scream anymore. Who laid on a hospital bed, half awake, thin and pale and bruised. 

“Johanna?” she asked softly. 

“Still here,” came Johanna’s weak response. “Go be with Finnick, Cresta. I’m fine alone.”

“I’ll come visit,” Annie promised, turning to leave. 

“I know you will.” A dose of morphling and Johanna was unconscious, drowning in her blankets. Hopefully, for the first time in weeks, she was warm. 

Annie joined Finnick back in the hallway, and he gave her a smile; a real one, that made his eyes crinkle. Her heart fluttered with excitement. He took her hand and they walked together, in their natural state of being joined at the hip.

“How was she?” Finnick asked. 

“She’ll be okay,” was Annie’s response. “We’ll all be okay, I think.”

**Author's Note:**

> Because Annie and Johanna friendship fics give me life. I hope you enjoyed this one.


End file.
